Last fall, while reporting on a company called Peak Design, which makes camera accessories and launches them, very successfully, on Kickstarter, I called up a bunch of venture capitalists to find out whether a proof-of-concept test like a crowdfunding campaign played into their decision to finance a company.
“One of the major traps that a V.C. can fall into is a focus group of one,” Dan Ciporin, of Caanan Partners, told me. Ciporin once found himself intrigued by a company seeking a second round of funding for “an internet-of-things sort of product.”
Image: Peter Dering, founder of Peak Design. (Credit: Eric Millette For Forbes)
http://www.forbes.com/sites/robbmandelbaum/2016/05/21/study-shows-crowdfunding-leads-to-more-funding/#515df0c24e8a